The Two Johns (working title)
by Uncle Dark
Summary: What if famous TV psychic John Edward were to find himself dealing with one of the many ghosts of John Constantine? Please R
1. Six Fags 'Till Doomsday

Disclaimer:  
  
John Constantine is the property of DC comics, used without permission. Present usage is not intended as a challenge to the copyright holder's ownership. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  
  
John Edward belongs to no one but himself. He is a real person, and has not been consulted or even notified as to his appearance in this and/or future chapters.  
  
Part One: Six Fags 'Till Doomsday  
  
Coincidence is an ugly mask. It's like when the doctor says "this won't hurt a bit" or when some bloke you've just met at the pub tells you he isn't married. It's an obvious lie covering an ugly truth, the sort of thing someone says when they want you to ignore your own better judgment.  
  
The bitch of it is, you almost always know better. You know the other guy's full of shite, but you go on with it anyway. Because it's easier, because it gives you an excuse not to take responsibility for what comes next.  
  
Because it's just a coincidence, you don't have to wonder if it's a link in some causal chain, binding you up with your past like old Jake Marley's ghostly chains and strong-boxes. It's just something that happened, just one of those weird things.  
  
Bollocks. I ought to know better by now, but I'm a lazy bastard at heart, and I'm willing to drift down the synchronicity freeway so long as I've got a pack of fags and a drink and nobody's getting in my face. So I ignore the big neon warning signs, take another pull at my pint, and tell myself, "John, me boy, relax. It's not all bad weirdness."  
  
At my age, with the places I've been, I really ought to know better. Let me tell you a story…  
  
I was in this fleabag motel in New York, waiting to get a packet together to pay for a flight back to London. I had a favor or two to call in, and I was waiting to hear back from somebody who owed me. The telly was worthless, as the only thing that came in clearly was this horrible pay- per-view porn channel. Besides anorexics with plastic tits, all I had to entertain myself was yesterday's Enquirer and a Gideon Bible.  
  
I opted for the fiction, and picked up the Bible. I was flipping through it, looking to see if anybody had marked their favorite excuse to hate somebody, when I discovered that the last half of the Revelation of St. John was missing. Some wit had ripped out everything from page 1203 on.  
  
I smirked to myself, feeling like I'd got a joke most people would have missed. It's like ripping out the last chapter of a mystery novel, I thought. Now I'll never know how the world ends. For laughs, I read the last words in the book: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me."  
  
That was when there was a knock at the door. I damn near leapt out of my skin, tossing the Bible off the end of the bed as I sat up. I had one foot on the floor and was reaching for the pack of Silk Cut and lighter on the nightstand, trying hard not to imagine what could be outside on the walk.  
  
That's when I bring out the ugly mask. "Get a grip, Constantine. It's just a coincidence." I shook out a fag and lit it, tossing the pack and lighter onto the bed. There was another knock at the door, and another, while I dragged smoke into my lungs and waited for the nicotine to calm the jitters in my hands. "Hang on a minute," I called to whoever it was, and went to the door.  
  
I looked through the peephole, but all I could see was the silhouette of a bald head, since whoever it was stood between my door and the streetlight. The person spoke, "Constantine? John? Open up already, it's fucking cold out here." That whoever it was knew me and managed to find me was not exactly reassuring, but I'd calmed down enough to put on the old Constantine glamour, all hard eyes and mystery. I opened the door.  
  
"Bloody hell…"  
  
The guy outside my door had seen better days. He was bald all right, completely, his hair, eyebrows, even eyelashes singed off in what could only have been a murderous fire. His skin was black and red, all cracks and blisters. His eyes were milk-white, but I still got the feeling that he was staring at me. Smoke trailed out of mouth and what was left of his nose, despite the fact that he had no cigarette in his hands. What clothes had survived were ripped and charred, stuck to his flesh with dried fluids I don't want to try to name. I don't remember checking, but I know he cast no shadow.  
  
"John," it said, reaching for me, "we gotta talk."  
  
I slammed the door then, throwing the bolt and putting the chain on. I'd be damned before I'd dine with that ghost, whoever he is or was. I just wanted a quiet night or three before the trip home. I'd left my long spoon in my other coat. Whatever the fuck it was, I wanted no part of it.  
  
I finished my fag in three more long, hard draws, and crushed the butt out in the little gold foil ashtray on the nightstand before sitting back down on the bed. I sat there massaging my temples while Smokey the Ghost was pounding away at the door and shouting my name. At least I knew that none of the neighbors was likely to complain, this was a message for my ears only.  
  
I threw myself back on the bed crossways, with my legs hanging off the mattress at the knees. I felt the packet of smokes crush under my back, and fished it and the lighter out with my left hand. Cursing quietly, I opened the pack and found, to my immense relief, that my last six fags had survived the accident. I sat back up, staring at the door, and realized that dawn was still seven long hours off. 


	2. Smoke and Mirrors

Disclaimer:  
  
John Constantine is the property of DC comics, used without permission. Present usage is not intended as a challenge to the copyright holder's ownership. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  
  
John Edward belongs to no one but himself. He is a real person, and has not been consulted or even notified as to his appearance in this and/or future chapters.  
  
Part Two: Smoke and Mirrors  
  
Is it a bad thing to lie a little, for a good cause? I'm not talking about fudging your taxes a little or telling your fat aunt that she looks like she's lost weight. In my work, I talk to a lot of people who want comfort. Some of them are curious, some are skeptical, a few are desperate. All of them are looking to me for some kind of answers. I don't always have them, but people expect me to, just because I can talk to those who have crossed over.  
  
I've had the gift since before I was twelve. I sometimes get images, sounds, or even smells from the other side. It's all in my mind, of course. It's like seeing the face of someone I'm talking to on the phone as I talk to them. Now, I do it for a living.  
  
The problem is that I don't really talk to people on the other side. It's not nearly that clear. I feel them extend their energy to me, like the feeling you get when someone is standing right behind you, and these images and sensations just float up into consciousness. Sometimes it seems like they're triggering images form my own experience, sometimes it's something entirely new. And it doesn't always seem relevant to whoever I'm talking to. Let me give you an example.  
  
I'd been on my feet for an hour and a half, standing under the studio lights in front of a particularly difficult crowd. I was getting plenty of images from the other side -- I always do, when I open up to it -- but I was having a lot of trouble connecting any of it to people in the audience. I'd had to rely on cold reading more than I like to. Cold reading is an old stage magician's technique involving using vague and leading statements to get a response and using the responses to zero in on what the person wants to hear. I sometimes have to use it to help me connect some image I get from the other side with a person in the audience.  
  
Through the evening, there had been two recurring images: a mirror and the smell of roasting meat. I'd brought them up a couple of times, since whoever was reaching out to me seemed fairly insistent, but no one in the audience took them. It was discouraging, I hardly ever draw such a complete blank when I'm on stage. I relaxed a little, knowing my editors would trim out the references that didn't pan out when condensing the two- hour studio session into a thirty-minute broadcast, but it still bothered me that I couldn't connect these images with anyone.  
  
"I want to acknowledge a mirror," I had said at one point. "Larger than a shaving mirror, but not mounted on a wall or anything like that. Maybe it's a hand-held mirror, maybe an heirloom piece, something inherited from someone who's crossed over." It wasn't an heirloom, I knew that, but I wanted to try and connect with someone. "Maybe not a mirror, maybe a picture frame? An antique?" I caught someone looking up at that. The studio techs with the boom mikes saw me focus in on that area of the stands, and moved in.  
  
It turned out that the man who had looked up at the mention of a picture frame had inherited an antique photo of his great grandparents, so I moved on to a name game. "I'm getting a 'J' name with the frame, Jack, John, Johnny, maybe a soft 'G,' Gerald or Jerry…" The old man's name had been Jerry, as it turned out. I fumbled around for a few minutes, trying to lock in the barbecue angle, but the guy simply didn't know that much about great granddad. He was happy to know that the old guy was still around and still checking in on the family from time to time, though. That exchange probably wouldn't make it into the final edit.  
  
Later I tried the barbecue angle. "I'm getting a strong grill-like smell. Like a picnic or a barbecue…" Again, no takers. "Some sort of party, outdoors, some family get-together…" Eventually, someone connected that with her mother's last birthday. This person was easier to read cold. I had to slow her down a bit, keep her from giving me too much and making the trick of it too obvious. That one would make it into the final cut, since she had tears and a smile. I might even have the crew make it the last segment, after cutting most of the middle out. It would make a nice, quick ending; a strong hit for me, a few quick questions and answers (with her leading trimmed out), and the emotional finish.  
  
We wrapped, and I was glad to have it over. Even though I was sure we had enough good stuff for a show, with a taped private session to pad it out, I still felt a little off. The barbecue smell and the mirror were still with me, on and off, as if whoever was sending it was unhappy that I hadn't made a connection for them. That was odd, really, usually it's the living people who are pushy about it. Still, a few minutes quiet in my office was all I needed to put it out of my mind.  
  
I like driving home myself, as it usually helps me get grounded in the physical world after a long session. Whoever it was tried again on the expressway. The smell was so strong I almost thought it was something in the car. Maybe it was stronger since there was only one person trying to come through. I really don't know. I do know that the image of the mirror, a round, black-framed mirror, superimposed itself on my rear-view. It reflected the road behind me just fine, but it wasn't the right shape or size. And it broke.  
  
I heard the glass crack quite clearly. It was then that I realized that I was dealing with a death by violence. That's always disturbing, both because of the sorrow it usually brings up in the survivors and the energy with which the people on the other side project it. Strong emotions are always tough to channel, and the bad ones are worse.  
  
The episode threw me. I usually don't take it so hard when one shows up uninvited, which is rare these days. It was a few minutes before I noticed that I'd missed my exit. I had to get off the expressway and turn around, and construction on the surface streets detoured me into a part of the city I wouldn't normally drive through.  
  
That's when I thought I'd hit someone.  
  
He was standing in the road. I remember that I didn't see him until it was too late, and that I thought he was black. Then I hit him, or at least drove through the spot where I'd seen him. I didn't feel an impact.  
  
I stopped the car and looked around, but I only saw one person, a white guy, on the street, standing on the curb and looking at me with irritation in his eyes. I got out to make sure I hadn't hit him. "You okay?"  
  
He took a puff on his cigarette and growled at me, "What the bloody hell do you want?" 


End file.
